“The Signature Symphony at Tulsa Community College treated the audience for its third Classics concert of the season to ‘A Night at the Opera,’ ” writes James D. Watts Jr. in Monday’s (1/29) Tulsa World (Oklahoma). “The concert, Saturday night at the VanTrease PACE, was also the second collaboration between the orchestra and Tulsa Opera, with members of the Tulsa Opera Studio Artists program serving as soloists, accompanied at times by a representative sample of the Tulsa Opera Chorus.” Music Director Andrés Franco led the Signature Symphony and soloists “in a thumbnail history of opera, from the late-Renaissance, exemplified by the Toccata from Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, to Puccini’s Turandot.… The concert also was a showcase for Tulsa Opera’s current artistic director, Tobias Picker, himself a highly acclaimed composer [of] five operas.… The concert’s second half was devoted entirely to Picker’s work, with selected scenes from each of his operas, as well as a solo piano performance by Picker of what is perhaps his best-known work, ‘Old and Lost Rivers.’ ” Selections included scenes and arias from Picker’s Therese Raquin, Dolores Claiborne, An American Tragedy, and Fantastic Mr. Fox.
Posted January 31, 2018
